The Wrath of Kings
by ElSlick
Summary: For twenty-three years the Kingdoms of Asira & Pyra had kept the peace ever since the crisis of the Nether portals that had been unleashed upon the land by the Nether Cult who failed to capture any wither skeleton heads to awaken their divine being they worship so much. In the cult's final demise, the Kingdoms forged peace treaties. But some kings will always strive for more land.
1. Prologue

The snow crackled with every step the polar bear took, to the patrollers of Earnside it was a smoothing sound they would never get tired of. The cold wind blew swiftly today & the sun shined down with no heavy snow to make it difficult to look around the forest, it made the patroller's job easier. Their thick white fur clothing keeping them warm, nobody in the Kingdoms of Asira knew how to make thick fur clothing like the people of Earnside & during times of winter, their trade with the other kingdoms would double because of their thick clothing & furs trade. Amongst the patrol group was a young lad no older than sixteen shivering on his bear, the Captain came around to him, "Oi, boy, you scared o' something?" Captain noticed quickly that the young lad had thick curly brown hair, brown dark eyes, with no facial hair; his skin was darker than anybody else is from the patrol group. Captain Riley laughed, "Ah, I see, you're a foreigner aren't ya'? That explains why you're not used to the cold, where you from boy?" the young lad turned to face the Captain who was a man in his late middle ages, his body was brute & bulky giving an expression of usage of heavy armor & heavy swords. Blue dark eyes that might show joy today but have seen terror & horror from the past. The Captain's hair was hid under a white fur cap. His beard, groomed as if had done it himself yet that's how it is naturally, "Oscana, Captain." The Captain gave back an expression that gave out confusion, wondering why a young lad like him would come deep from the south of Asria's desert & come north to the bitter cold.

"Oh? Why come all the way over here? Our people are complete opposite, we survive in the everlasting cold & your people survive in the everlasting heat… & sand."

"After my father died, my mother insisted we come live in Earnside."

"Why would your mother want to live in Earnside?"

"She's from Earnside, Captain."

"Really? So you have Earnside blood within ya'?"

"Ay, Captain, although, I'm used to the heat more, not the cold. It's been five months since we've moved to Earnside, & my body is barely getting used to the cold, just that the mornings are coldest for me. Just give me a few more hours & I'll stop shivering Captain."

"Good lad." The Captain moved up ahead a few feet more before asking, "By the way, boy. What's your name?"

"Fai, Captain." The Captain grinned, nodded his head & rode ahead.

Fai stopped shivering after a few minutes after the talk, it seemed to Fai as he was already getting used to the morning colds now. The patrol went on for few hours before a patrol scout whistled from afar, Captain & the others rode towards the scout; In their midst was a burnt body still fresh as if it was burned this very morning. Captain Riley jumped off his bear & examined the burnt pile of flesh; to him, the scent felt nostalgic & familiar but the fact it felt nostalgic & familiar gave him a chill in his spine. He raised his head & starred at the sky, by the position of the sun he was able to tell it was high noon by now. He hoped back up onto his bear & shouted, "Listen! This burnt body is still fresh from this morning we should split up into groups & find the sick bastard who did this & have our Queen judge him or her accordingly, hell there may be more than one of them! Keep your guard up!" Fai joined a group of four people only because they were the closet to him at the time. They all looked a few years older than him but looked the same age as each other, although being with older men, he was alright with that, to him, joining with older people means he'll be learning more stuff from the more experienced. One of them came up to him, he was handsome man with crystal blue eyes, & a light scar stained the left side of cheek. His red hair lied free, resting on his broad shoulders, his beard was trimmed nicely down. He seemed elegant & graceful than the other two in the group, "Oi, You know how to fight?"

"Of course" Fai said. He nodded & rode off with the group saying, "That's good, if we do find the people who burnt that body & it's just us; we better have all the fighting power we got." Fai took that as a warning of some sort but he couldn't figure out what it was, he shrugged it off & caught up with his group. One of the other patrol men came up to him from behind, his physique was bigger than any of them, his red hair tied in a ponytail curling up onto his broad shoulder, he smelled of Ale, blue dull eyes that spoke of fighting & Drinking. "Don't let Aidan get to ya'. He's always like that, just because he's heir to House Bryne." Fai looked at him & then back at Aidan who was alone leading the patrol team, "He's heir to one of the biggest Houses in Earnside?"

"Well, I wouldn't say biggest. Our Queen's House is the biggest. House Walsh…the name's Brian by the way; Brian of House Flynn." Brian said trying to hand shake Fai's hand from his bear.

"So your House is a big one too?" Fai asked.

"Mine, 'pfft'. Fuck no. We're just bloody carpenters." Brian laughed as he rubbed his stubby beard. "Brian, are you trying to make your House' name sound large again?" one of the patrollers came about from the back, "Oh, can it, Kean. Your house isn't big also." Brian smirked back. "Ay, but I don't go showing mine off like it's a big house like Aidan's House." Kean laughed as he rode off to get away from Brian. Kean was slender than all of them, his hair left messy as if he just woke up from bed, he shaved all facial hair from his face showing off his great jaw line & cheek bone. If someone were to compare him to Aidan, he'd make Aidan look average. His blue eyes shined with laughter but it also shined with skills with a bow. "It seems you three go way back." Fai said. "Ay, you can say that, we go way back, when we were just some children noting givin' a bloody fuck about anything. I guess we were lucky to be friends the three of us; if Aidan's father would've died in the crisis twenty-three years ago, Aidan would probably have no time to dilly dally around with any of us. He'd probably be busy doing…doing what large houses normally do."

"You know anything about the crisis?" Fai asked. "No, nobody likes to talk about it. Especially not the ones who have been a part of it during the fighting N' stuff. All I know is that it's a lot of bad shit. But that doesn't matter right now, all we need to do is find the sick bastard who burnt that body & bring him to justice." Brian gave a finger salute to Fai & kicked his bear to jog & chase up to Kean who was far ahead from them. The quietness of the forest couldn't be more unsettling, there is a killer out here in these forests & Fai & his group was looking for that killer or killers. Not too long from thinking that, the Aidan found a cave, he ordered everyone to hop off their bears & search inside, he lit four torches he had in his sack hanging off his back & gave them to everyone. The caves floors were rocky & required careful footing, the ceiling of the cave was short but gradually become taller along the way. To Fai, the cave was more unsettling than the forest, hearing only the group's footsteps & water drippings gave him a most unsettling feeling, was it fear he thought? Was the thought of getting killed scarring him? Actually, it wasn't the thought of dying; it was the thought of getting tortured & burned alive that gave him that unsettling feel. They reached a fork in the cave, four pathways, one for each patroller, they all looked at each other & nodded in agreement before heading to their different pathways. In the end of Fai's pathway was just a dead end, giving out a sigh of luck that he didn't run into any killers by himself & hurried back the way he came. On his way out he met Aidan coming out of his pathway, "Dead end too?" Aidan asked. Fai simply nodded & both headed to the third pathway before finding Brain steeping out of his pathway, "Dead end on you too?"

"Yep, got that right."

"Alright, let's move on to this pathway."

The third pathway was short & stubby forcing them to hunch a little on their way in, Fai took the rear guard, & seemingly enough, the pathway became more open & wider giving a relive on their necks & backs. "By Ameria how long is this pathway?" Brian moaned. They caught up with Kean who was originally taking this path by himself, "Oi, what are ya' doing here?"

"Our paths lead to dead ends, & it seems yours takes forever." Brian said.

"Well, then. Follow me lads."

The more they walked down the path, the more noises they started to hear; They walked slower to draw out less sound to themselves & lucky for them, their fur boots weren't made of iron. They all took precaution, keeping their guard up & unsheathing their swords as quietly as they can. Fai gripped tightly on his hilt; from their distance they were all able to see a seemingly small shine, was it a fire? They slowly walked closer to it; two torches laying across the floor spread out from each other losing their shine of light in the darkness of a medium sized room covered in moss, the light of the torches couldn't reach the top of the ceiling, although, nobody gave no attention to that. The found a man in dark black robes with red trims laying stiff & still on the floor, the man looked older than Fai but younger than the others. Kean kneeled down in front of the body examining it, he tilted his head looking for any wounds that could have cost him his live. Kean saw it in the corner of his eye while checking the neck area, a gaping wound in his stomach area, it had been hard to tell since blood wasn't shown much thanks to the dark robes not allowing it to show any color. Kean gently slicked his fingers into the gaping hole in the body's stomach & slowly took it out, on his finger was a green like puss, it wasn't slimy but it did give Kean a disgusting feeling for having it on his fingers, "His been poisoned." Kean said wiping off the poison on the body's robes.

"By what?" Fai asked.

Kean rose from his kneeling position & held up his torch up into the air, trying to unravel the ceiling above them, "By cave spiders." The slithery slime of spider legs came from above, the four of them went back to back, swords ready to swing, their torches up in the air. The green like spiders were everywhere with endless numbers, "Well, fuck me on a bloody Monday, boys." Brian said with spirit.

"Now is not the time to act like a big shot Brian." Kean said calmly.

"Oi boy, show me what ya' got." Aidan said to Fai.

One by one the spiders jumped into the air landing next to them or attempted to jump on their body or face. Fai's swords cut through the air as he slashed a spider's head off with one stroke, & pinning another one down with his sword & setting it on fire with his torch, "Dammit! When will it all stop!" Kean screamed as he cut a spider in half in its attempt to jump on him. Before long more men came out of the pathway swinging their swords at the spiders, it was Captain Riley & the rest of his group to aid Fai & his group. The cave spider's came in fewer numbers as time passed & in no time they stopped showing, it gave Fai's group a sigh of relive, "We saw ya' bears outside idling by. So we decided to enter & pay ya' a visit to these girl scouts to see if their alright' but to our surprise-you lot were backed up in a corner crying for us to help, ha-ha!" One of the patrollers said playfully.

"Oh, can it Ned, I kicked your ass before I'll kick your ass again!" Brian screamed joyfully.

Throughout all the laughing & shouting Captain Riley kept a straight face when he approached the corpse of the man in the black robes. Once the others started realizing Captain Riley's expression they stood quiet, awaiting a command from him. He hovered around the room shining his torch among the walls searching for something, nobody in the patrol groups knew what he was looking for in particular. Captain Riley stopped hovering around the rooms walls for a moment & stood around a particular part of the room's wall, Fai peaked at it from where he was standing, there was obsidian around that section with a seemingly decent opening to it, although, Fai noticed the top right corner of the obsidian was mined off. "Captain…What is it?" One of the patrollers asked. "That's a Nether portal isn't it, Captain?" Fai said. The patrol men seem uneasy after hearing that, they have all heard the stories of the crisis of twenty-three years ago, they all knew who & what caused them. "Ay, Right you are, Fai." Captain Riley said still staring at the Nether portal back, "Fai, you & your group will follow me back to Earnside, we have to inform Queen Gilly about this…& one of you bring the dead body along for proof. The rest of you will cut out the eyeballs of the spiders & give it to our Master Alchemist, after that, head back to the Earnside." The tension that came about after that reached to everyone, nobody couldn't ignore the fact that someone tried to reopen the Nether portals after what devastation happened twenty-three years ago. "But, Captain, we still have to find that killer who burnt that body." Aidan claimed.

"That won't do. That burnt body outside was already a corpse before we found it." Captain Riley said.

"Captain, you don't mean bloody Witchcraft? Do ya'?" Brian asked.

"Maybe that's why there were two torches in the floor before we came here, maybe the necromancer fled the scene once the cave spiders showed up." Kean pointed out.

"Ay, Luckily the Witch isn't an expert at necromancy or she could've summoned up more than thirty. Now either the Witch was held against her will from this Nether Cultist & being forced to do necromancy or they were working together. But right now, we need to get back & give this urgent news to our queen, now." Fai stared back at the Nether portal before helping Kean drag the corpse out; the feeling of knowing that something like this can bring an entire different world into Asira & Pyra ran a chill into Fai's spine giving not only darkness, but also fear.


	2. Sorry for the wait

Sorry for not updating the story for this past month. I had trouble with loans & financial aid this month & it had me unsettled for a long time but now all that cleared up. I will start working on chapter 2 tomorrow. Sorry for the long wait.


End file.
